Service Design Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Service Design
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring Service Design skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 24 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
24 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 154 198 158
Rank change year-on-year +44 -40 +10
Contract jobs citing Service Design 301 158 297
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 1.65% 1.06% 1.53%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.92% 1.22% 1.74%
Number of daily rates quoted 232 98 242
10th Percentile £350 £404 £404
25th Percentile £443 £463 £480
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £521 £550
Median % change year-on-year +3.12% -5.23% +1.85%
75th Percentile £638 £600 £627
90th Percentile £738 £690 £675
UK median daily rate £513 £525 £550
% change year-on-year -2.38% -4.55% -1.79%
Number of hourly rates quoted 12 3 0
10th Percentile - £27.44 -
25th Percentile - £28.97 -
Median hourly rate £60.00 £31.52 -
Median % change year-on-year +90.36% - -
75th Percentile £77.34 £34.26 -
90th Percentile £97.25 £35.90 -
UK median hourly rate £60.00 £32.64 -
% change year-on-year +83.85% - -

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK excluding London

Service Design falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 15,689 12,960 17,106
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 85.83% 87.26% 88.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,582 7,621 11,014
10th Percentile £220 £239 £250
25th Percentile £375 £381 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £476 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -4.80% - -
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £688 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,758 745 1,210
10th Percentile £14.38 £15.50 £14.25
25th Percentile £17.30 £20.00 £17.72
Median hourly rate £23.54 £31.50 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -25.28% -30.00% +42.45%
75th Percentile £50.00 £64.10 £65.00
90th Percentile £68.03 £73.14 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £43.90
% change year-on-year -22.62% -25.97% +25.43%

Service Design
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Service Design relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Service Design job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Service Design
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Service Design.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Service Design

Service Design
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Service Design in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 24 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Service Design in the UK excluding London

Service Design
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Service Design.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Service Design

Service Design
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Service Design in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 24 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Service Design in the UK excluding London

Service Design
Contract Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Service Design within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 24 December 2025. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
North of England +11 94 £465 -2.11% 43
South East +22 72 £538 -2.27% 56
South West +22 60 £725 +20.83% 24
North West -5 47 £424 -13.13% 17
Scotland -10 27 £475 -5.00% 15
Yorkshire -14 26 £500 -6.98% 18
Midlands -34 26 £494 -15.96% 32
West Midlands -20 22 £455 -22.55% 17
North East +11 21 £454 +0.89% 8
East of England -8 15 £550 -3.51% 24
Wales - 9 £328 - 5
East Midlands - 4 £800 - 11
Northern Ireland - 2 £625 - 2
Service Design
UK

Service Design
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 40 (13.29%) Confluence
2 9 (2.99%) SharePoint
3 5 (1.66%) Microsoft Exchange
4 3 (1.00%) Apache
5 2 (0.66%) IIS
5 2 (0.66%) WebSphere
6 1 (0.33%) Apache Airflow
Applications
1 43 (14.29%) Microsoft Office
2 30 (9.97%) Microsoft Project
3 8 (2.66%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 7 (2.33%) Microsoft Excel
5 4 (1.33%) Adobe XD
6 3 (1.00%) Adobe Creative Suite
6 3 (1.00%) Sketch
6 3 (1.00%) UserZoom
7 2 (0.66%) InVision
7 2 (0.66%) MS Visio
8 1 (0.33%) Adobe Illustrator
8 1 (0.33%) InDesign
8 1 (0.33%) Photoshop
8 1 (0.33%) Spreadsheet
8 1 (0.33%) Trello
Business Applications
1 6 (1.99%) Maximo
1 6 (1.99%) Remedy ITSM
2 2 (0.66%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.33%) NetSuite
3 1 (0.33%) Oracle EBS
3 1 (0.33%) SAP ERP
Cloud Services
1 24 (7.97%) Azure
2 20 (6.64%) AWS
3 17 (5.65%) Figma
4 16 (5.32%) Power Platform
5 12 (3.99%) SaaS
6 9 (2.99%) Amazon S3
6 9 (2.99%) AWS Lambda
6 9 (2.99%) Google Analytics
6 9 (2.99%) Miro
6 9 (2.99%) Serverless
7 8 (2.66%) Google Tag Manager
7 8 (2.66%) Microsoft 365
8 7 (2.33%) AWS CloudFormation
8 7 (2.33%) GCP
9 5 (1.66%) OneDrive
10 4 (1.33%) Amazon ECS
10 4 (1.33%) Azure DevOps
10 4 (1.33%) OpenShift
11 3 (1.00%) Boomi
11 3 (1.00%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 3 (1.00%) VPN
2 2 (0.66%) Firewall
2 2 (0.66%) WAN
2 2 (0.66%) Wireless
3 1 (0.33%) Cisco ISE
3 1 (0.33%) HTTP
3 1 (0.33%) LAN
3 1 (0.33%) PBX
3 1 (0.33%) SD-WAN
3 1 (0.33%) Unified Communications
3 1 (0.33%) VoIP
3 1 (0.33%) WebEx
3 1 (0.33%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 13 (4.32%) Power BI
2 7 (2.33%) BigQuery
2 7 (2.33%) Looker
3 6 (1.99%) Amazon Aurora
4 4 (1.33%) PostgreSQL
4 4 (1.33%) Tableau
5 3 (1.00%) Amazon RDS
5 3 (1.00%) SQL Server
6 2 (0.66%) DB2
7 1 (0.33%) EDRMS
7 1 (0.33%) MariaDB
7 1 (0.33%) MySQL
7 1 (0.33%) Power Query
7 1 (0.33%) QlikView
Development Applications
1 41 (13.62%) JIRA
2 5 (1.66%) Jenkins
3 4 (1.33%) Cypress.io
3 4 (1.33%) webpack
4 2 (0.66%) Axure RP
4 2 (0.66%) GitLab
5 1 (0.33%) JMeter
5 1 (0.33%) Mocha
5 1 (0.33%) Postman
5 1 (0.33%) Selenium
General
1 127 (42.19%) Social Skills
2 82 (27.24%) Public Sector
3 49 (16.28%) Analytical Skills
4 33 (10.96%) Finance
5 32 (10.63%) Military
6 13 (4.32%) Influencing Skills
7 10 (3.32%) Presentation Skills
8 9 (2.99%) Banking
9 6 (1.99%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 6 (1.99%) Legal
9 6 (1.99%) Retail
10 5 (1.66%) Telecoms
11 3 (1.00%) Advertising
11 3 (1.00%) Local Government
11 3 (1.00%) Organisational Skills
12 2 (0.66%) Aerospace
12 2 (0.66%) Marketing
12 2 (0.66%) Publishing
13 1 (0.33%) Financial Institution
13 1 (0.33%) Law
Job Titles
1 90 (29.90%) Architect
2 71 (23.59%) Service Architect
3 61 (20.27%) Designer
4 41 (13.62%) Service Designer
5 32 (10.63%) Analyst
6 26 (8.64%) Senior
7 24 (7.97%) Lead
8 23 (7.64%) User Researcher
9 21 (6.98%) Service Manager
10 20 (6.64%) Consultant
11 19 (6.31%) Business Analyst
12 15 (4.98%) Service Transition Manager
12 15 (4.98%) Transition Manager
13 12 (3.99%) Senior Analyst
14 10 (3.32%) Service Design Consultant
14 10 (3.32%) UX Designer
15 9 (2.99%) Developer
15 9 (2.99%) Service Design Manager
16 8 (2.66%) Senior Designer
17 7 (2.33%) Performance Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 8 (2.66%) HTML
1 8 (2.66%) React
2 7 (2.33%) CSS
3 6 (1.99%) AWS CDK
4 5 (1.66%) Node.js
4 5 (1.66%) RESTful
5 4 (1.33%) CSS3
5 4 (1.33%) FastAPI
5 4 (1.33%) HTML5
5 4 (1.33%) Redux
5 4 (1.33%) SailPoint
5 4 (1.33%) Vue
6 3 (1.00%) Django
6 3 (1.00%) Flask
6 3 (1.00%) Oracle Fusion
6 3 (1.00%) SOAP
7 2 (0.66%) .NET
7 2 (0.66%) OAuth
7 2 (0.66%) Web Services
7 2 (0.66%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 45 (14.95%) Product Ownership
2 10 (3.32%) NHS
3 9 (2.99%) Onboarding
4 6 (1.99%) Cloud Native
4 6 (1.99%) CMDB
5 5 (1.66%) Management Information System
6 4 (1.33%) Data Centre
6 4 (1.33%) Mobile App
7 3 (1.00%) Hybrid Cloud
7 3 (1.00%) IVR
7 3 (1.00%) Legacy Systems
8 2 (0.66%) Digital Wallet
9 1 (0.33%) Algorithms
9 1 (0.33%) Analytical Mindset
9 1 (0.33%) Blackberry
9 1 (0.33%) Cyberattack
9 1 (0.33%) Data Structures
9 1 (0.33%) Driving Licence
9 1 (0.33%) PMI
9 1 (0.33%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 7 (2.33%) Windows
2 4 (1.33%) Windows 10
3 2 (0.66%) Windows Server
4 1 (0.33%) Android
4 1 (0.33%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 136 (45.18%) Agile
2 109 (36.21%) ITIL
3 101 (33.55%) Service Management
4 66 (21.93%) User Research
5 62 (20.60%) User Experience
6 55 (18.27%) Acceptance Criteria
7 48 (15.95%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 41 (13.62%) TOGAF
8 41 (13.62%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
9 40 (13.29%) Project Delivery
9 40 (13.29%) Stakeholder Management
10 36 (11.96%) Continuous Improvement
10 36 (11.96%) ITSM
10 36 (11.96%) Workshop Facilitation
11 34 (11.30%) Critical Thinking
11 34 (11.30%) Problem-Solving
12 33 (10.96%) Knowledge Transfer
12 33 (10.96%) Roadmaps
13 32 (10.63%) Service Delivery
13 32 (10.63%) UX Design
Programming Languages
1 12 (3.99%) JavaScript
1 12 (3.99%) TypeScript
2 9 (2.99%) Python
3 3 (1.00%) SQL
4 2 (0.66%) R
5 1 (0.33%) Bash
5 1 (0.33%) C#
5 1 (0.33%) Java
5 1 (0.33%) PowerShell
5 1 (0.33%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 126 (41.86%) Security Cleared
2 102 (33.89%) SC Cleared
3 44 (14.62%) Degree
4 35 (11.63%) TOGAF Certification
5 12 (3.99%) DV Cleared
6 6 (1.99%) AWS Certification
6 6 (1.99%) Azure Certification
6 6 (1.99%) BPSS Clearance
6 6 (1.99%) ITIL Certification
7 2 (0.66%) ISEB
7 2 (0.66%) PMI Certification
8 1 (0.33%) APMG
8 1 (0.33%) APMP
8 1 (0.33%) CCNP
8 1 (0.33%) Cisco Certification
8 1 (0.33%) CISM
8 1 (0.33%) CISSP
8 1 (0.33%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
8 1 (0.33%) PMP
8 1 (0.33%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 44 (14.62%) Accessibility
2 30 (9.97%) ISO/IEC 20000
3 15 (4.98%) QA
4 9 (2.99%) Data Quality
5 6 (1.99%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 5 (1.66%) Actionable Recommendations
6 5 (1.66%) SLA
7 4 (1.33%) GDPR
7 4 (1.33%) ISO 9001
7 4 (1.33%) WCAG
8 1 (0.33%) Disclosure Scotland
8 1 (0.33%) HL7
8 1 (0.33%) JSP 440
8 1 (0.33%) NCSC
8 1 (0.33%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.33%) PSD2
8 1 (0.33%) SNOMED CT
System Software
1 6 (1.99%) Docker
2 3 (1.00%) VMware NSX
3 1 (0.33%) Active Directory
3 1 (0.33%) Virtual Desktop
3 1 (0.33%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 30 (9.97%) OPNET
2 7 (2.33%) Kubernetes
3 5 (1.66%) Terraform
4 4 (1.33%) Grafana
5 3 (1.00%) Single Sign-On
6 1 (0.33%) Ansible
6 1 (0.33%) Microsoft Intune
6 1 (0.33%) SCCM
Vendors
1 51 (16.94%) ServiceNow
2 37 (12.29%) Microsoft
3 36 (11.96%) Remedy
4 30 (9.97%) Atlassian
5 9 (2.99%) Google
5 9 (2.99%) VMware
6 8 (2.66%) Adobe
7 7 (2.33%) Cisco
8 5 (1.66%) Salesforce
9 4 (1.33%) Oracle
9 4 (1.33%) Palo Alto
10 3 (1.00%) Genesys
10 3 (1.00%) OneLogin
10 3 (1.00%) SAP
10 3 (1.00%) UiPath
10 3 (1.00%) Zscaler
11 2 (0.66%) IBM
11 2 (0.66%) Juniper
11 2 (0.66%) Nokia
12 1 (0.33%) CheckPoint